


time goes by and i can't control my mind (just keep breathin')

by LadyAlice101



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Arranged Marriage, As it should be, Domestic Fluff, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Sharing a Bed, and that's all this is, i just want it, i mean they all are but this is about sansa, not even spec bc like i don't find it particularly realistic, post war for the dawn, s8 is killing me and it hasn't even started yet, sansa is very sad, who's alive? who's dead? do you think i know? bc i don't
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-13
Updated: 2019-04-14
Packaged: 2020-01-12 14:09:56
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 10,577
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18448169
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyAlice101/pseuds/LadyAlice101
Summary: “She’s grieving," Arya says, "I’ve never seen her like this and I don’t think she should be alone, but I - . . . have you ever seen her so sad?”Jon’s face has pulled down, the lines etched across it deeper than she’s ever seen them, and there’s a true sorrow in his eyes. “Once or twice,” he answers quietly. “You’re right, she shouldn’t be alone."-We have sad Sansa being comforted by Jon, we have arranged marriage, we have pining, we have feasts, we have bed sharing! This one is just chock full of tropes friends.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> anyway s8 is going to be the death of me, whether it turns out the way I think it will or not. 
> 
> this first chap is much heavier than the second, and was written pretty much entirely as a catharsis for myself, but the second chap is MUCH more romantic so be on the lookout for that

Sansa can’t get out of bed.

She certainly doesn’t want to, but duty compels her.

And yet, she has not been able to manage it. She’s uncomfortable, the pillow wet and sticking unpleasantly to her swollen face, her hair unwashed for several days and laying limp and greasy against her head, and she’s terribly cold. The fire has burnt out and she hasn’t let anyone enter her chambers since yesterday. While winter rages on, it’s warmer than it was, and she’s burrowed in furs, but that can only do so much.

The wind howls outside. She knows it likely means a blizzard, though she won’t get up to confirm, and if it’s a blizzard then she’ll have a busy day ahead, trying to keep the castle organized and safe.

The thought makes more tears slip from her eyes, dripping off the tip of her nose, or rolling down her face, only adding to the damp pillow. Funny. She thought she was cried out.

Sansa pulls the furs up, just a little bit higher, to rub the moisture from her nose, then she closes her eyes and pretends its still nighttime and that she’s not needed just yet.

Another knock on the door makes her squeeze her eyes shut tighter, so tight that she see’s stars and she gets dizzy.

There’s another knock, a little firmer – though still faint, as far away as it is – and Sansa keeps ignoring it. She doesn’t know who it is. Probably Brienne, concerned about her wellbeing, though maybe it’s her handmaiden.

Sansa doesn’t know and she can’t open her mouth to call out to them because if she opens her mouth she’ll start to sob again and she’s already cried so much through the night.

The person doesn’t knock again, but instead of relief Sansa only feels guilty and a fresh round of tears falls.

Why is she so weak? It should be so easy to get up and go about her day, like she has for so many moons now, but it’s like she physically can’t lift her legs. It’s all in her mind, she’s painfully aware of that, and that only makes it worse.

She should be able to do this. The war has been over for a moons turn now, and finally things are starting to get better. Only two days ago a hunting party had come back with enough kills to feed the castle for weeks; slowly but surely the smallfolk were leaving the refuge of Winterfell to return to their homes; the sickness that had struck the castle as the men had trudged back in from the war was finally leaving their midst.

Things are finally getting better.

So why is it now that she can’t get out of bed?

There’s another knock on the door to her solar, more urgent this time, and then she can hear the door creak open. Sansa pulls the furs over her face, trying to hide her tear-stained face.

The door to the solar closes, though Sansa hears no footsteps. It mustn’t be Brienne, then. They knock on the door from the solar into her bedchambers, and still Sansa doesn’t answer.

“Sansa!” It’s Arya. “Are you in there?”

Sansa clears her throat, then tries to call out, “Yes,” but it comes out cracked and dry and like she’s dying.

The door swings open.

“Gods, Sansa, it’s freezing in here!”

Still Sansa hears no footsteps, but she can hear Arya throwing wood on the coals and slowly coaxing it back to life. She hears the roar of the fire, and Arya prodding it a bit more, and then the end of the bed dips.

“Why are you still in bed?” Arya asks. “It’s almost midday. Brienne is sick with worry that you’ve been murdered and she’s been standing outside your door all night. I don’t know how she thinks someone got past her, murdered you, and then came back out without her noticing, but she thinks it all the same.”

Sansa doesn’t laugh.

She just reaches up to try and rub away her tears, which are mercilessly replaced by more no matter how hard she tries.

“Seriously, Sansa.” Arya pulls back the furs ruthlessly, exposing Sansa’s bare skin to just how cold the room truly is.

She’s wearing only a shift. Her skin immediately raises into goosebumps, and she tries to pull the furs back without cluing Arya in to the fact that she’s crying.

Last night, dressed in her thick sleeping wear, Sansa had felt like she was suffocating. She’d pulled and tugged and ripped her clothes off in a sobbing mess and she’d stared at all her hideous scars and remembered the awful circumstances under which she’d gotten them, and then she’d fallen into her bed and curled up and stared at the wall until the sun had risen, and finally she’d decided she needed to start her day and that was about when she realized she couldn’t move.

Arya shimmies up the bed slowly, like she’s just now realizing that something is wrong. Sansa flinches when Arya puts her hand on Sansa’s leg, and Arya removes it quickly.

“Sansa, what’s happened?”

“Go away, please,” Sansa croaks out.

She’s still crying. She can’t talk about it. She’ll cry harder.

“Sansa?”

Is that fear in Arya’s tone? Desperation? Worry?

“I’m fine,” Sansa whispers, because it’s much easier to say that than to try and explain that she’s not fine but she doesn’t know why.

Arya goes quiet, but she stays sitting on the bed. She doesn’t try to comfort Sansa again, and Sansa doesn’t quite know how she feels about that. She wants something, from someone, but she doesn’t know what and she doesn’t know from whom. She feels empty, and she needs someone to fill that emptiness, because she simply just can’t do it herself today.

In the meantime, she doesn’t want Arya here to watch her be like this. Arya doesn’t need to worry about her, and Sansa is okay with falling apart by herself.

“I’m fine,” Sansa repeats. She swallows, then takes a big breath to calm herself enough to speak with Arya. “Could you bring me my work for the day?”

Arya’s tone turns downwards into disapproval. “ _Sansa_.”

“Is there a blizzard outside? Has everyone been brought inside?”

“Have you eaten today?” Arya asks instead of replying, and Sansa goes quiet. She doesn’t remember when she last ate, truthfully. She’d worked through dinner last night, and she’d skipped lunch, but she _had_ broken her fast yesterday.

Arya sighs. “Well, I’m glad you’re not dead,” she says finally. Sansa feels her stand. “I’ll come back later.”

Sansa doesn’t again ask Arya to bring her her work. She doesn’t want to do it today.

Arya closes the door to the bedchamber.

Sansa’s glad that at least she’s stopped crying.

 

-

 

“Is she in there?” Brienne asks anxiously as Arya closes the door to Sansa’s chambers.

“Yes, she’s fine,” Arya answers.

It’s not entirely true, though Arya doesn’t exactly know what the issue truly is. She just knows she’s woefully underprepared to deal with it, and she needs help.

Arya hurries through the halls of Winterfell, leaving Sansa’s chambers behind in favour of finding someone to get some advice from.

She heads first for the forge, because that’s where she always goes when she needs help.

Gendry immediately drops what he’s doing to come and cup her cheek.

“What’s wrong?” he asks, worry creasing his brow. “Are you hurt?”

Arya rolls her eyes and pushes his hand away. “Aye, I’m fine. It’s Sansa.”

“Is she okay?”

Gendry looks just as worried about her sister, and it’s one of the things she loves about him. He cares no less for Sansa’s wellbeing than he does for hers, even though he’s only in love with one of them.

“Well, she’s . . .” Arya brows furrow. She doesn’t really know how to describe how Sansa is, other than that seeing her scared her. “She was crying. She wouldn’t get out of bed. She was despondent, Gendry. She didn’t answer half of my questions, I don’t think she even heard me speaking sometimes. I’ve never seen her like that.”

Gendry’s face morphs into grief. “Oh, Arya. She’s mourning.”

“Mourning what?” Arya asks, perplexed. No one had died recently, and the war has been over more than moon’s turn. People mourned still, _continued_ to mourn, but she’s not heard of people starting to mourn with no impetus.

Gendry shakes his head, a true sadness etched onto his face. “Everything, I should expect,” he says, “people mourn differently, Arya. When has she ever even had a chance? This must be her first time without enemies, without something or someone demanding attention. Some people grieve during their trauma, and some people can hold themselves together up until everything is over and there’s no need to keep soldiering onwards.”

Arya steps into his embrace, lets him wind his arms around her shoulders and lay his head atop hers. She forgets, sometimes, how much everyone has lost. That Gendry’s grief-stricken face is as much a reflection of his own heartache as it is empathy with Sansa; that Sansa spent as many years alone as Arya did, surrounded by enemies who tortured her and wanted to kill her; that she herself carries a deep heaviness in her heart that never gets lighter.

“When I get that sad,” Gendry murmurs, “all I want is to be beside you. You always know what to do.”

Arya doesn’t think that’s true at all. She just does what she thinks might help, what she would want someone to do for her. It works with Gendry, which is why they are so well-suited, but it never works with Sansa. Arya always cocks it up with Sansa, one way or another. The only person who ever seems to always say the right thing is -.

Arya leans up on her toes to press a quick kiss to Gendry’s cheek. “I’ll see you later.”

Gendry squeezes her hand, then lets her go. He goes back to his work and Arya glances at him over her shoulder as she leaves. She doesn’t know how she ever pushed through what she did without something like him to work towards.

It takes Arya longer than she expected to find Jon, and by the time she does she’s worked herself into a frenzy that Jon takes one look at her and drops the quill he has in hand to stride over to her and seize her shoulders.

“Sansa?” he asks urgently.

“She’s okay,” Arya says, then hesitates, “well, physically, but –“

“But what?”

“Let me finish,” Arya says peevishly, stepping out of his reach and crossing her arms. “She’s grieving. I’ve never seen her like this and I don’t think she should be alone, but I - . . . have you ever seen her so sad?”

Jon’s face has pulled down, the lines etched across it deeper than she’s ever seen them, and there’s a true sorrow in his eyes. “Once or twice,” he answers quietly. “You’re right, she shouldn’t be alone. You should be with her.”

Arya shakes her head before he finishes speaking. “No, I - . . . I never say the right thing. I certainly didn’t make her feel better just now. _You_ should go.”

Again, there’s heartache on Jon’s face. She’s seen it more and more on them since the war ended, since he married Sansa, and she doesn’t particularly understand. She knows that it must be odd, for them to have been family and then be in an arranged marriage, but she also knows that they were both so relieved that neither of them would have to leave Winterfell, leave each other, that they could be safe here and not ever have to face the prospect of marrying an unknown. Since then, their relationship has steadily dissolved into awkward meetings and spending as little time together as possible.

But Jon _knows_ Sansa, understands her in a way that Arya doesn’t, hasn’t been allowed to, and so for this it must be him.

“You’re being an idiot,” Arya says. “Stop being a coward and go and help her!”

“I – yes, yes. I will. Just - . . . come as well, so that she may decide on your help, if she desires.”

Arya takes great effort not to roll her eyes, and instead grabs his arm and drags him out of his office. He needs no more guidance than that, and his legs carry him quickly through the halls, quick enough that Arya has to lengthen her stride in order to keep up with him.

When they arrive, he ignores Brienne entirely, and raps briskly on the door.

“She hasn’t been answering,” Brienne supplies.

Jon hesitates, like this means the door is impassable.

Arya turns the knob. The door is unbarred, like it was earlier. Jon is obviously unnerved by this, and Arya had been, too. If Sansa wasn’t answering and they could still get in, it meant that she must not have barred the door overnight. She must have stumbled in late last night in quite the state; it’s always the first thing she does. This doesn’t bode well for her state of mind.

The solar is tidy, a jug of water and a plate of bread and cheese sits on the table in the centre of the room.

Jon goes to it immediately and pours a cup of water. He takes a deep breath, then goes to the door that opens into Sansa’s bedchambers. Arya hangs back, unsure if she’s really going to follow Jon. She’d said she would, but she hadn’t really meant it.

“Sansa?” Jon calls out softly. “It’s Jon. May I come in?”

Arya doesn’t expect a reply, but Jon must get one, because he opens the door with no hesitation.

Arya rocks on her feels, but Jon looks over his shoulder at her so she follows him in.

“Sansa?” Jon repeats. “It’s Arya and I.”

Sansa’s head shift on the pillow, just enough so she can see them. Or Jon, rather. She doesn’t even look at Arya.

“Jon?” Sansa whispers.

Arya slips from the room, unnoticed.

 

-

 

Jon’s heart thuds at the sight of her, and he has to remind himself that Arya said she’s not physically hurt right now.

He kneels beside her.

“Have some water, Sansa,” he says softly.

Her eyes slowly move from his face to the cup he’s holding, then back to him.

“Come on,” he says, and places it on the bedside table. “I’ll help you up.”

She doesn’t move as he works his arm under her shoulders, though she doesn’t flinch either. She’s almost dead weight against him as he sits her up, but she doesn’t fall back down when he removes one arm to get the cup from the table.

He brings it to her lips and she drinks from it slowly as he tips it up. They stay like that for minutes, he patiently coaxing her until she’s drunk the entire cup.

He puts the cup back and then let’s her lay back down.

He kneels beside her again. Her mouth opens a little, her tongue poking out to wet her dry lips, and he knows he did the right thing by making her drink some water.

“Sansa,” he says quietly, “will you tell me what’s wrong?”

Tears well up in her eyes, and she doesn’t say anything, doesn’t even shake her head.

Jon reaches out, pushing her hair from her face.

“My sweet Sansa,” he whispers, “I’m so sorry.”

And then she starts to cry.

Not just cry; but sob, wracking, heart-breaking sobs, so hard she can hardly breathe, so much that her body heaves.

He closes his eyes for fear that he will start to cry himself, then undoes the clasp of his cloak and pulls off his boots. When he’s just in his shirt and breeches, he slides in to the bed beside her. She clutches at him desperately, fingers winding into the material of shirt, her face pressing into his chest.

He holds her head gently, his other hand sliding up and down her back in slow, soothing motions.

“I miss them so much,” she cries, “I don’t want to be – I wish that they –.”

She interrupts herself with more sobs, but Jon knows what she’s thinking anyway. He thinks it himself.

And so he can’t help but cry, too.

They stay like that for hours. Sansa sooths herself as often as she cries, and Jon lays by her side the whole time. He doesn’t say much, though he knows Sansa doesn’t need him to say anything, she just needs him to be beside her, to remind her that she hasn’t lost _everything._

When the sun starts to set, there’s a knock on the bedchamber door.

Sansa’s eyes are closed, and he thinks that maybe she’s sleeping though he can’t be sure, and he won’t speak a word because she’s too light a sleeper.

Slowly and gently, he extracts himself from her grip. She murmurs softly, but her eyes don’t open, so he quietly walks to the door and opens it, then slips through.

Arya stands on the other side, looking nervous.

“She’s okay?” she asks.

Jon nods, then smiles tiredly. “She’s okay.”

“Have you been crying?”

Jon rubs his face, and doesn’t answer.

“Is everything okay?” he asks instead.

Arya nods slowly, then juts her thumb over her shoulder. “I brought supper and more water.”

“Thank you, Arya. I’ll make sure she eats.”

Arya hesitates, then rocks on her heels. “Are you to stay here tonight?”

Jon sighs impatiently. He and Arya have not really talked about his marriage to Sansa since it happened. She’d made her annoyance perfectly clear in the beginning, and no matter that their marriage was a strategic one, Jon daren’t speak to Arya about it in fear of admitting that he wasn’t as opposed to the marriage as he ought to be.

He maybe even desired it.

“I’m her husband, Arya, it isn’t improper if I do.”

Arya furrows her brows. “I know,” she says, annoyed. “I was going to suggest I stay if you weren’t going to. It’s not like you and she have spent any significant time together since you got married.”

Jon purses his lips. She’s right, of course, though she probably thinks he’s stayed away from Sansa for a different reason than he has. Maybe she thinks he mourns his Targaryen lover, though he doesn’t, or maybe she thinks that they’re just too busy, which even if he were he would always make time for Sansa, or maybe she even thinks that they’re too repulsed by the nuptials to see each other, which is so far from his truth he’s ashamed to admit it even to himself.

Truthfully, he’s stayed away because he’s scared of what he might say or do, of what he might admit to her if he’s given even the slightly opportunity. And Sansa is obviously in enough distress without needing to worry about him and his desires, too.

“I’ll stay,” he says firmly, if a little weary. “Goodnight, Arya.”

Arya nods and turns to leave without another word. Jon rubs his eyes as the door closes behind her, then takes a deep breath and turns to the table. He busies himself with poking through the food Arya brought, trying not to think about anything.

But he’s too worried about Sansa. He knows that eventually she will pull herself out of whatever this spiral is, but no matter that he’s seen her life this before, he doesn’t find it any easier than he had then. The first time he had been so woefully unprepared, and he knows he was very little help. They’d been at Castle Black still, she’d arrived maybe three days before, and one morning he had woken in his chambers, in the chair in front of the fire, Sansa in his bed, and she had been crying. He’d stood beside her, unsure, until she had bid him from the room and stayed locked in there for the day.

Brienne hadn’t had an explanation, as miffed as he, and had only imparted on him Ramsay’s brutality, though in less detail than Sansa herself had already told him.

The second had been nigh on a week after they had taken back Winterfell. That had been during the night, had not lasted anywhere near as long as this, but that time he had stayed with her and held her and given her water, but he hadn’t understood.

He understands, now.

She has breathed too much life into him for him to not understand.

Arya has brought them warm bread and hard cheese, some quince paste and grilled sausages.

Sansa will like it.

He turns to go and wake her up, but she’s already standing in the doorway, still only in her shift, her arms folded around her stomach.

“Sansa.”

“Is that food?” she asks, stepping towards him.

He moves to the other side of the table, exposing to the plate to her. She takes steady steps towards it, her eyes on the table and not him and sits down. She rips off a chunk of bread and slices some cheese, then spreads paste and layers on the cheese and sausage.

She starts to eat quietly. He knows better than to say anything, so instead he turns to the fire. Jon pokes and prods and adds logs until it’s roaring again, and finally when he can distract himself no more he turns back to her.

She’s still eating, slowly, but her eyes are on him. He catches her eye and she lowers her own.

Jon purses his lips. He wonders if he should leave. If things hadn’t been so tense between them recently, he knows without a doubt that he would stay with her. Nothing is more important to him than Sansa.

 _It’s not like you’re getting back in her bed,_ he tells himself, and he prays she mistakes the pink in his cheeks for the warmth of the fire.

Silently, he takes a seat opposite her. He eats some sausage first, then some bread, and quietly he and Sansa finish the rest of the food.

Arya’s not brought any ale, but the food isn’t too bad, especially compared to Castle Black, or even what they were eating during the war. It’s even good enough that he tries to savour it, but years of consuming just for energy has instilled in him the habit of eating quickly and efficiently.

They stay silent long after the food is gone, the crackling of the fire filling the room. Jon has no idea what to say, what to do. He thinks he should leave, but he misses her. He wants to stay.

She doesn’t move, though, and eventually he realizes that if she doesn’t say something soon, he’ll have to excuse himself. Otherwise they’ll be sitting here quietly all night.

Eventually, long after the food and water are gone, he stands.

“Well,” he says awkwardly, “I think it’s about time to retire for the evening.”

Sansa purses her lips and looks up to him for the first time. “I’ve been in bed all day,” she says quietly, “I think I’ll stay up.”

Jon rocks on his heels. He’s not sure what to do. He doesn’t want to leave her, least of all because he promised Arya he wouldn’t, but now he’s all but told her he wants to go.

Sansa, bless her soul, offers him his opportunity. “If you’re not too tired, you can stay?”

“Yes,” he says, too eagerly. He clears his throat and tries to cover it up. “Ah, aye, I can stay for a little while.”

Sansa gives him a small smile, then disappears in to her bedchambers. He goes back over to the fire and pokes it again, because just standing around feels too awkward, but the fire is still doing well and so he has to abandon it.

He takes a seat in the chair he so often used to sit in, and lets himself yearn for those days. Simple as everything is now with the war over, he adored those more challenging times, simply because he and Sansa were a team. It was he and she against the world, and it had made him feel so content. Now, more often than not, he feels as though he and Sansa are waging a silent war against each other, and for the life of him he can’t figure out why.

All he so desperately wants is to be allowed to love her.

Sansa reappears in the doorway, donned in her thick nightgown. He’s seen her wear it a few times, so he recognizes it, but when they used to sit here they would usually still be in their day clothes. Before today, he’s never seen her so exposed.

He hadn’t thought on it earlier, so consumed with worry as he was, but he knows that image of so much skin, of her pressed against him, will be something that he carries with him to his bed.

Sansa comes to take a seat on the chair opposite him, her sewing in her lap. She leans over, a thick book in hand, and gives it to him.

Jon takes it from her, his eyes fixed on the cover.

“You were reading this before you left,” she says quietly, her eyes on him, “you didn’t finish.”

“I remember.”

“The ending is the best part.”

Jon lifts his eyes to her. He is struck with the memory of Sansa handing him the cloak he still wears, that she had spent weeks sewing for him, and he is just as touched by this gesture as he was that. It may not be as grand, but it is no less thoughtful.

Like then, he can’t help the awe that creeps in to his voice. “Thank you, Sansa.”

She ducks her head. He wonders if she thinks of those times as often as he does.

They lapse into silence as they both go about their own activities, but Jon can hardly keep his focus. He eyes keep lifting to her of their own accord, and the sight of her bare legs is superimposed on this view of her now.

He wonders what those legs would feel like locked around his waist, if they would tighten as he rocked in to her, how her breasts would heave –

“You saw.”

Jon is ripped from his imagination when Sansa speaks. He feels his cheeks burn with his shame, furious with himself for picturing such things.

Sansa is looking at him, her face unreadable. He’s not sure what she said.

“What?” he chokes out.

“My scars,” she says dully, “you saw them.”

He blinks several times. He supposes that he had, and when he thinks about it he can picture them marked along her legs, her arms, he’d even felt raised skin under his fingers on her back.

He wonders what it says about him that he looked straight past them and just saw her body. Nothing good, he’s sure.

He doesn’t reply, unsure what to say.

“They’re disgusting,” she whispers, looking away from him. “I’m sorry you had to see them.”

His eyes widen. “Sansa, no, _no._ That’s not – please don’t – I’m _not_ -.”

He snaps his mouth shut for fear that he will reveal something that he shouldn’t.

Sansa lifts her eyes to his. Does she know what he was going to say?

“I have scars, too,” he says, instead of finishing his previous thought about how she’s the most beautiful woman he’s ever seen and how her scars are a part of her and he loves every part, and that disgust is the last thing he feels when he looks at her. Recklessly, he continues, “Do you want to see them?”

Sansa tilts her head like she can’t help herself.

“Do you want to show me?”

 _Want_ to show her? No. No, he would spare her the evidence of his betrayal. Does he care, though? If she wants to see, then no he doesn’t.

He shrugs clumsily and folds his hands on his lap.

Sansa stands, putting her sewing on the chair behind her. She pauses for a moment, then hesitantly comes to stand in front of him.

Jon clenches his fingers tighter together so he doesn’t try to touch her.

Sansa own hands wring in front of her. She stays there for several moments, and Jon can’t help that his breath starts to come harsher.

Slowly, one of her hands lift up to his face. His shoulders shudder with the force of his pants. Sansa, however, is completely still, her breathing paused.

Gently, the tips of her fingers touch the scar over his eye. His eyes flutter closed and he leans into her hand. Her hand is soft and warm against him. It takes all the strength he has to not sigh with contentment.

They stay like that for almost a minute, then Sansa moves her fingers to the tip of his scar and traces a line down it.

“I can hardly see it now,” she whispers. “I remember when it was marked into you deeply.”

Jon’s mouth parts as she runs her thumb down it again.

Her other hand comes to rest on his shoulder. “Can I see the one that killed you?”

Jon opens his eyes.

 _This is dangerous,_ he thinks.

But she’s his wife. Is it truly so bad?

Their eyes locked on each other, he undoes the laces of his shirt, baring a deep V of his chest. She kneels in front of him, her gaze dropping to his revealed skin. He pulls the side of his shirt aside, exposing the unhealed gouge of the stab wound.

Her hand dips from his shoulder. Her touch doesn’t linger over his chest, like he masochistically wishes it would, instead her fingers reach immediately for the ugly lesion.

She gasps when she touches it, and his breath hitches too. She’s never seen a single one, and he’s let never anyone touch them, not like this. While the wound has technically healed, it hasn’t done so traditionally; it’s never sealed, there’s no wet blood, but it’s black and he knows the skin around is dead because it’s numb, and he hates these scars because they’re just so fucking unnatural.

Still, her touch makes him shudder. It’s like life travels from her and in to him, clawing and sparking and so godsdamned beautiful.

Sansa’s voice interrupts the trembling quiet. “It’s very . . .”

She doesn’t finish her thought, but that’s okay. There’s not really an adequate description for them.

“Do they disgust you?” he asks.

Sansa’s eyes lift to him. “No.”

“They’re not nice,” he presses.

Quietly, though with more defiance, she says, “I don’t care.”

He reaches up to fold his fingers around her wrists, his thumb smoothing over her palms. “I don’t care about yours either.”

“Really?”

“ _Really._ ” He hopes his earnestness convinces her. Her eyes fill with tears again. He’s not sure, then, that he’s succeeded.

But she just sighs, a sweet sigh that sounds like his name, and folds herself into his lap. He wraps his arms around her, and though she’s as tall as him, she still settles comfortably against him, her head nestled in the crook of his neck.

She’s still crying, though, softly, but it makes his heart ache as much as her sobs do.

“Jon?” she asks eventually. “Will you stay with me tonight?”

He runs his hand down her hair, and leans his head against hers. “Of course, sweet girl.”

“Let’s go to bed.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This, Jon moans inwardly, staring resolutely into his cup, pointedly ignoring the vision that is his wife, this is why I didn’t want a feast.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> while the first chap was sad and a way for me to work out my feelings about some of my own current grief, this second chapter caters to my more romantic whims, and is much happier! i hope this second chap heals you from the sadness of the first, like it did for me! 
> 
> happy game of thrones premiere day! i unfortunately can't watch live but i will be viewing in the next few hours and i'm counting down the minutes. i hope all our jonsa dreams come true

“I think we should have a feast,” Sansa announces.

Jon lifts his head up, startled. Arya doesn’t look too surprised, though she does look up from her spot on the floor, too. Bran looks the least shocked of all, but there’s a small smile on his lips.

“The people are restless and unhappy,” Sansa continues. “They need something to cheer them up. We’re almost six moons post war. We should feast.”

Jon blinks several times. “We can’t afford a feast,” he says finally.

Sansa puts her sewing in her lap. “I’ve been looking over the accounts, and I think if we shift a few things we’ll be able to. The people _are_ unhappy, aren’t they, Arya?”

Arya does look startled this time, especially when Jon turns to look at her.

“Well?” Jon asks when she doesn’t say anything. “Are they?”

Arya shrugs slowly. “I wouldn’t say _unhappy_ ,” she says carefully, “but discontent.”

“They’re cold,” Sansa offers, “and hungry. I’ll organize the entire thing.”

Jon, bless him, realizes quickly enough that any argument he gives will inevitably end with him losing and therefore a waste of time, so he nods his consent.

She can see he still has some reservations though, and if they were simply of an administrative or organizational nature he would surely have said them in front of their siblings. As it stands, though, she and Jon have come to a silent agreement to shield Arya and Bran from as much torment as they can; oh, they don’t lie, and anything truly important is shared, but while all the Starks mourn for themselves and what they lost, Jon and Sansa mourn for Arya and Bran, too. Sansa isn’t sure what it is, perhaps just the simple fact that they’re the older siblings, or perhaps it’s because they’ve filled Ned and Catelyn’s roles so absolutely, but whatever the reason, Sansa – and she knows Jon, too – finds herself more than a little protective of her younger siblings.

She would spare them any and all further torment, even if it were just Sansa’s own insecurities.

And clearly, Jon’s objection must come from a place of concern for her, otherwise he would broach it here.

She lets him stew on in for a while longer, but eventually she see’s him start to squirm often enough that she knows he’s getting anxious.

Sansa pretends to yawn, then rolls her shoulders and puts down her sewing.

“It’s getting rather late,” she says, “I think I’ll retire for the evening.”

Jon stands immediately. Sansa has to stop herself from rolling her eyes. “Aye,” he says eagerly, “a good idea.”

Arya looks up from where she’d been petting Ghost. “Alright,” she says suspiciously, narrowing her eyes and looking between the two. Sansa wonders what it is she suspects. Something far more promiscuous in nature than is the truth, probably. Sansa hopes that that thought doesn’t show on her face, though she suspects it does because Arya’s lips turn down in a medium of disgust.

Sansa steadfastly avoids Jon’s eye.

Arya is trying, they all are, but Sansa knows that she herself has acclimatized to her marriage much quicker than anyone else. She hardly objects to Jon’s nature, knowing as she did when they went into it that he would treat her better than any of her previous husbands (not that that’s a high standard), or any potential suitor, really. But, more than that, she thinks she might love him.

Not as she should.

But as a wife loves a husband.

She wouldn’t be entirely opposed to them going to bed together in the nature that Arya suggests.

Because go to bed together they will, as they have been since Jon comforted her nearly five moons ago. Just not in the way that Sansa is slowly recognizing she wants.

Arya stands and takes hold of Bran’s chair. Sansa drops to press a kiss to the crown of Bran and then Arya’s head, and Jon does the same. Arya looks disgruntled but Sansa knows that this domesticity pleases her, as it does Bran, who gives them a small smile, and as it does she and Jon, who can’t help but look after the departing pair fondly.

When the chamber door closes, Jon goes over to bar it, and Sansa takes the opportunity to retire in to the bedchambers before he can open his mouth.

If Jon desires to talk about it, then she knows it must be important to him, but she’s not sure she wants to weather it just yet. She takes a seat at her dressing table, starting to unwind her braids.

Jon comes in only a moment later and starts to tend to the fire, as he does every night. It may not be as bone chilling a cold as it had been during the Long Night, but winter still demands a heavy toll.

Once he’s satisfied, Jon steps away from it to prepare himself for bed. There are two washbasins that have been filled with hot water by Sansa’s handmaiden in the corner of the room, and Jon goes to one to wash his hands and face, sighing with pleasure as he does every night.

Sansa takes the time to carefully brush her hair, something that brings her as much peace as Jon washing his hands brings him.

“Well,” Sansa says, turning to face Jon as she gathers her hair in her hands to rebraid it for sleep, “what’s wrong, then?”

Jon smiles ruefully as he starts to undress. “Am I that predictable?”

Sansa turns from him to give him some privacy. Still, the sound of his undoing laces and buckles fills the room, followed shortly by the noise of clothes dropping and being folded.

“Predictable enough,” she responds vaguely, feeling an all too familiar need warm her bones.

“It’s not that I don’t want a feast,” Jon says slowly, “if the people are bothered, this is a very easy solution.”

“I agree,” Sansa says, tying off the end of her plait.

He stays quiet for a moment, and the noise of clothes rustling once again fills her ears. “I just think it’s a responsibility you don’t need at the moment,” he says finally.

Sansa turns to him to raise a disbelieving brow before she can think better of it. Luckily enough – or unluckily as the case may be – he’s dressed in his sleepwear and slipping under the furs.

“You’d rather we deal with a riot in a moon’s time?” she asks.

He huffs. “You know that’s not what I mean.”

She purses her lips. “Aye, I know.” She sighs. “I think it will be worth the extra effort.”

She stands from her chair. Jon turns away to pick up the book on the bedside and lifts it up above his face. Sansa appreciates the gesture, she still does, even though he does it every night. Secretly, though, she craves his attention.

Sansa changes quickly into her sleepwear, then goes to her own washbasin. The sound of the water prompts Jon to lower his book to a more appropriate eyelevel.

“I will share the work load with you, then,” Jon says.

Sansa can’t but a laugh as she dries her face and hands. Jon’s lips downturn into a displeased frown.

“Apologies, my King,” Sansa says demurely, trying to push the smile from her face but not quite managing it, “I just can hardly picture the greatest swordsman to ever live attempting to coordinate his formalwear to the table clothes.”

Jon’s eyes widen slightly. “That’s something that has to be worried about?”

Sansa laughs in unabashed delight. She so adores this man. “It’s rather important, I’m afraid.”

She sits back at her table and reaches for her jar of hand cream.

Somehow, Jon still manages to look hopeful. “I could be in charge of food, perhaps.”

Sansa smiles as she rubs in the cool cream. “Did you know that the Lady Mormont can’t have goat’s milk or it’s products? She almost died as a child from it.”

“Well, no, but -.”

“And Lord Cerwyn, too, can’t eat nuts. I’ve heard his face swells up so badly he can’t breathe.”

“Okay, Sansa -.”

“And baby Sam is frightfully picky with his food, and he eats it mushed up! I don’t know how he tells the difference, honestly.”

Jon sighs heavily. “You’ve made your point, Sansa, no need to further humiliate me.”

Sansa laughs again, then stands. She pulls back the furs of the bed and settles in. “Don’t worry, Jon, I have it handled.”

He raises a brow and puts his book back on the bedside. “ _Have_?” he asks. “I should have known that you’d already started organizing.”

“What can I say, I’m an organized woman.”

He smiles fondly at her, then turns to blow out his bedside candle. Sansa does the same.

“Organized indeed,” he says softly, then reaches out to her.

She tucks herself into him, one arm resting under her head, the other wrapping around her back.

They don’t do this very often. Enough that she knows the routine, knows exactly how to fit her body against his, but she never initiates and Jon usually saves it for when he’s feeling particularly emotional. Good or bad, it doesn’t matter. Whenever he seeks her, she always goes.

His fingertips trace a slow line up her back. She hides the shudder it induces by pretending to shift around and get more comfortable. Sansa regrets it a moment later though, when his hand stills and doesn’t move again.

She keeps in her sigh, because if she sighs Jon will probably move away completely, so she does what she does best and settles for less than she wants, and tries to get some sleep.

 

 

-

 

 

 _This,_ Jon moans inwardly, staring resolutely into his cup, pointedly ignoring the vision that is his wife, _this is why I didn’t want a feast._

Sansa is absolutely glorious in her new dress, laughing in delight and swinging through the dances and partners. His hands clench around his cup with the ache of stopping himself from going straight to her and touching her, fingers gently pressing in to her waist, pulling her hips against his, maybe even in all the commotion he would find an opportunity to discreetly press a kiss to her lips.

The chair next to his scrapes loudly as it’s pulled back from the table. Jon jumps, startled.

Arya scoffs loudly, obviously drunk and delighted from all the dancing.

“You’re a little bitch, you know that?” she says, then leans over to steal his cup of ale. “You’re seriously a sad sight, up here on your fuckin’ lonesome.”

Jon turns to her, eyes wide at her language and impertinence.

“I’m your King, you know,” he says, displeased.

She shrugs. “And a little bitch,” she says, then slams the cup down on the table. Jon takes it back, but she’s emptied it.

“Alright, Arya, I think you’ve had enough.”

“If you’re looking to tell a woman what to do, perhaps you should go to your wife. Maybe just spend some time with her at all.”

Jon reels back from her, indignant at what she’s implying.

“ _Arya._ ”

“You’ve not noticed all the Lords looking at her?”

“Of course I’ve noticed,” he snaps, because it’s true. It’s another reason he hadn’t wanted a feast. In the absence of Jon’s affection, of staking a public claim of her – preferably, to the Lords, by way of her stomach rounding with his child, but they would settle, for now, with an appropriate kiss between them, of Sansa dancing almost solely with her husband – they think that Jon is lax enough to either not notice their stares, or maybe even not care.

The smallfolk, who Jon had also worried about, are much more respectful of their Queen, even though she dances amongst them, too.

They’ve not overstepped their boundaries, not in the way Jon has spied several young lords doing this evening. Sansa’s been graceful in sidestepping the lords’ more risqué advances, moving a hand too lowly placed, putting distance between bodies pressed too closely together, but she hasn’t declined a single man a dance, no matter who they are.

“ _So,_ ” Arya says, propping her legs up on the table. Perhaps Jon should not care for propriety now, when it’s late, and most are so deep in their cups they won’t remember this come morning, but he does. He glares at her until she pulls her boots from the tabletop. “Go and stop them! Declare her as yours, give her some attention!”

Jon looks down from the table and out to the crowd. It’s extremely easy to find Sansa, tall as she is, her hair as bright as it is, the crown perched atop her head as it is.

Jon and Sansa had protested the wearing of crowns tonight profusely, but Davos had strongly recommended it, and even Arya said it might be a good idea to remind everyone _exactly_ who was welcoming them into their home for the night. Davos had capitulated and said that they could take them off during the night, if they pleased, which Jon has long ago done, but Sansa’s still sits as neatly atop her head as it had at the beginning of the night.

She’s spinning from partner to partner, but finally she settles with the young Lord Karstark. The young boy is absolutely besotted with Sansa, even daring to go so far as to place his hands too low on her waist, pulling her too close to him. Sansa laughs, but allows it. Jon, however, can’t help the tiny flower of rage that unfurls. She would dare let him do that? With her husband sitting in the same room? With other Lords looking on, taking his lead?

“She’s getting attention enough,” he says bitterly, going to take another drink before remembering that Arya finished it.

Arya takes an immediate affront to that. She narrows her eyes at him, then bites out, “Not from anyone that matters.”

She grabs the crown that’s sitting on the table in front of him as she stands. Arya shoves it into his chest and he scrambles to catch it.

“She’s your Queen,” Arya hisses, “show her some respect.”

Arya disappears in to the crowd, leaving Jon at the table, alone, with just his crown for company, and Sansa laughing with the people.

 

 

-

 

 

When Sansa has finally had enough of the festivities, later than most but not as late as some, Jon still sits at the high table. He’s surly, and brooding, but the one time she’d convinced him to dance with her he’d put enough of a smile on his face that she’d been content.

He’d retreated from the floor soon enough, a melancholy smile on his face, and it makes Sansa wonder what he’s thinking. The smile is tragic enough that she has to wonder again if it’s his Targaryen Queen his thoughts linger with. He’d assured Sansa, before and after they got married, that he harboured no feelings for the dead Queen, never had, but sometimes such longing, such sorrow, fills his eyes when he looks at her that she can think nothing other than that he must desperately wish she were someone else.

Jon had taken her arm in his and smiled at her gently, and then led her through the halls of Winterfell and to their rooms. She’d chatted to him the entire time, and he’d gazed at her fondly, only encouraging her, but now they’re in the bedchambers and Jon has slipped into bed first, like always, and she thinks she might be about to do something drastic.

“Are you alright, Sansa?” Jon asks from his spot on the bed. She’s paused after washing her hands and face. “Did you have too much to drink?”

Sansa purses her lips and takes a seat at her dress table, unscrewing the lid of her hand cream.

“No, I’m fine,” she finally says, when she’s sure she’s not going to blurt out her true thoughts.

Because, truthfully, he’d looked extremely handsome tonight. Their matching colours may not have mattered to him, but to her, it marked him as hers. But as much as she loved his clothes on him, the sound of them coming _off_ as he readied for bed has made her hot with desire.

She’s not sure how she’s going to get in bed beside him.

Jon doesn’t reply to her, but she hears him shift around in the bed. She does what she can to put it off, but if she doesn’t join him soon he’ll know for certain that something’s different, and she can’t have him asking questions.

Eventually, suppressing a sigh, she joins him in the bed.

Jon’s eyes are closed, but he’s facing her, and quietly he rumbles, “Did you have a nice night?”

She smiles widely, even though he can’t see it.

“Jon,” she says earnestly, “I had the most beautiful night.”

He smiles, too, then reaches his hand out to her, leaving it to lie between them. She takes it easily.

She so ardently loves him.

“That makes me so happy to hear, Sansa.”

With no need to worry about being caught, she lets herself look over his face.

The deep scar over his eye is so faded, now, compared to how it was when she first saw him at Castle Black, though it’s still clearly defined.

Her eye’s lower to his chest. The memory of the scar on his chest is burned into her forevermore, as unique as it had been, but the glimpse of his muscled chest is what her thoughts most often linger with.

His cheeks are starting to fill in again, though with how little food he’d eaten while he was at war she’s not surprised it hasn’t taken too long. They’re flushed, from a combination of ale and the heat from the fire. His hair isn’t pulled back like it is normally; instead his curls are falling freely over his head.

Sansa lets her eyes fall down to his lips. She doesn’t usually let her gaze linger on them, but his eyes are closed. She’ll let herself, just this once. His lips are pink and plush and beautiful, and not for the first time she wonders what they’d feel like against hers. She’s never experienced a kind kiss, let alone the type of kiss she hears whispered about by other ladies and servant girls; the mind-blowing, life-changing, toe-curling kind.

Jon would be a gentle kisser, Sansa thinks. He would kiss her softly, though he would guide her, maybe he would hold her hand. When the time comes that he must take his rights so they can produce an heir, perhaps she’ll even be lucky enough that he might take his time to try and make her comfortable, or maybe even just give her a moment to get herself slick.

She groans slightly and lets go of his hand, suddenly heavy in hers, and turns onto her back.

“What’s wrong?” Jon asks, worry clearly lining his voice.

Sansa huffs. “Nothing,” she replies, but she sounds frustrated, even to her own ears.

Jon stays quiet a moment, then says, “Is this about tonight? Because I didn’t join you dancing?”

Sansa almost laughs. No, it most certainly isn’t. Truthfully, she doesn’t know if she could have handled him dancing with her more than he had, especially with how much wine she’s had. He’s been kind to her, he’s danced with her, he’s looked at her with desire in his eyes even if the desire is not for her, then he’d shed his unbelievably handsome clothes to get into her bed and then he’d held her hand and she wants.

She wants him, so, so badly.

They’ll have to lay together eventually, they all know, but Sansa wants him to take her _now_ and she wants him to be compelled by something other than duty.

She doesn’t reply, just turns on her other side so her back is facing Jon, and she wonders if Jon detects as much petulance in the silence as she does.

Jon’s hand lightly touches her back.

Her breath hitches in a gasp that fills the room.

His hand pulls back.

“No, no,” she whispers, before she knows what she’s saying. “Touch me again.”

Well. Something drastic indeed.

There’s several moments where he does nothing, and Sansa can’t bear to face the shame of her demand.

But then his hand curves over her waist, sure and true, and her own hand whips down to his to draw it further around her.

“Sansa,” he says lowly, warningly, “don’t do this if you don’t want to.”

His voice makes her drunker than all the wine she’s ever had.

“I do,” she breathes, “I do, I want it so badly, Jon.”

Her voices sounds whiny to her own ears, but Jon must find something desirable in it because his breath intakes sharply and then he’s pressed entirely against her back.

His nose nudges against the back of her head, his breath hot and panting against her neck.

“From me?” he asks, as Sansa guides his hand upwards to her breast. “Do you want it from me?”

Sansa rocks her hips back into his, on instinct, because she’s never done anything like this before but her body burns with the need to move, to be satiated in some way. Jon’s strangled whine, though, makes her stop.

“Sorry,” she gasps, “I’m sorry, I -.”

“No, no,” he rushes out, “I liked it, I like it.”

Sansa pauses, then quietly, before she can lose her nerve, she asks the question she left unanswered from him. “From me?”

She hears him groan again, and then feels the press of a light kiss against the back of her neck.

“Aye, sweet Sansa, from you. No one else. There will never be anybody else.”

This time, she believes him.

“And you?” he asks again. “Do you desire another man, or am I enough?”

“You are not just more than enough, Jon, you are the only man I desire, have ever desired. Will ever desire.”

His hand clasps her jaw and tilts her head upwards so that he capture her lips in a searing kiss. Their first kiss since their wedding. While he’s gentle, like she had pictured, he is so much more; there is an urgency, a need, a fierce passion that somehow only makes her grow hotter still.

His hand leaves her jaw to travel down her body and rest on her thigh.

Jon pulls his mouth from hers. Sansa chases it, completely wrecked. She feels him smile against her cheek, his nose bumping against her temple.

“Tell me if you want to stop,” Jon murmurs, “if you get uncomfortable, if you just want to slow down. Tell me, okay?”

“Okay.”

His grip tightens on her thigh, and he moves his mouth down to her neck.

“You – you’re the same,” Sansa stutters, because Jon may say he desires her but perhaps he will look upon her face and remember that they grew up as siblings and want to stop, “if you want to stop. We can.”

“Trust me,” he murmurs, hiking her skirts up to her waist, “I won’t want to.”

His hand dips immediately beneath her small clothes to find her cunt. His fingers brush against her nub, and immediately her hand flies down to grasp his wrist.

“Sorry, too fast,” he mutters.

“No, no,” she gasps, her face flushing, her grip tightening around his wrist. “It’s just – a lot, but good. Keep going.”

He does as bid, hesitantly at first, but her hips buck back involuntarily against his hard cock and he let’s out a hissed breath. It doesn’t take much more encouragement than that for him to dip his fingers a little further down.

He groans, murmuring, “So wet, is this all for me?” then slides a finger inside her.

Her nails dig into the skin of his forearm, she gasps, set alight. Her other hand closes around the edge of the bed. Jon pulls his hand from her and she keens with disappointment, but all he does is spread her legs by lifting one up and resting it back and atop his, and then he has two fingers inside her and she burns, she aches, there’s so much tension in her that has nowhere to go except –

Jon presses himself against the line of her back as she peaks, his open mouth against the back of her neck.

Jon stops his ministrations as she come from down from her high, kissing her neck as she does.

“You’re alright?” he asks as her pants slow down.

“That was – very good,” she manages to get out.

He chuckles against her throat, then presses a kiss there before moving his hand from her thigh and sucking his wet fingers into his mouth.

Sansa’s eyes widen and she turns over to face him, watching.

“That’s very craven,” she tells him, breathless.

He raises a brow. “Is it?” he asks, his lips twitching. “Do you want a taste?”

Sansa licks her lips, her gaze dipping to his fingers. He holds his hand out, and hesitantly she grips his wrist and brings his fingers to her mouth. She takes the tip of his middle finger in her mouth. It tastes . . . odd, least of all because she knows where it came from. It doesn’t particularly make her feel more need, but the sight of Jon’s mouth thinning and his eyes going dark with undeniable desire _does,_ so she takes his whole finger into her mouth.

“ _Fuck_ ,” he whimpers, and someone how that single dirty word fills her with a deep gratification.

He pulls his hand from her grip and hastily starts to undo his breeches. “Can I – can we -,” he stumbles desperately.

Sansa smiles. “Yes, I’d like that.” And it’s true. As satisfied as she had been by just Jon’s touch, more so than even from her own fingers, and as glorious as peaking under his ministrations had been, she wants more.

She wants to look up at him as he thrusts inside her, she wants to gasp his name and have him gasp hers, she wants him to spill inside her so that perhaps she might quicken with his child and show to everyone once and for all that she is his and he is hers.

Jon pushes his breeches off then rolls onto his back.

“Would you take your dress off?” Jon asks.

She hadn’t even remembered she was wearing it. She’s unsure she wants to, but her reservation lies with her scars and Jon has seen those. He doesn’t care, he’d said.

Sansa undoes the buttons of her nightdress, but hesitates with her shift. “Do you mind if I keep this on?” she asks, biting her lip, because she wants to please him, but she can’t face everything in one night.

“Of course not,” he reassures, taking her hand to lead her back on to the bed. “Would you like me to keep my shirt on?”

Sansa can’t help the flutter in her chest at the question. He obviously knows exactly the reason she doesn’t want to take her shift off, and doesn’t want to reveal his own scars if Sansa doesn’t want to see them. But she doesn’t mind his scars. They’re a reminder that she could have lost him before she ever got a chance to fall in love with him, and if that doesn’t humble her before the gods and Jon in gratitude then she doesn’t know what will.

“You can take it off if you’d like,” she tells him.

He smiles, then takes it off. She lies beside him, expecting that he might climb atop her now, but he doesn’t. Instead, he takes her hand again and tugs her towards him.

“Come up here,” he says, guiding her so she sits on his hips.

“You can do it like this?” she asks, a smile spreading across her face. Yes, she thinks she’ll like this.

“We can do it however we want,” he says, smiling back at her, pleased with her delight.

Sansa rises onto her knees as Jon takes himself in hand. She sinks down on to him, bracing her hands against his chest, her head falling forward as she moans.

Jon sounds just as wrecked as she does when he groans and grips her hips.

Hands clenched around his shoulders, Sansa moves.

Oh, yes, she really likes this.

In this position, Sansa focuses entirely on her own pleasure. Her eyes closed, all she can think about is the way he feels inside her and how she moves to best take as much bliss as possible.

Jon groans beneath her, hips rocking up occasionally, when he can no longer help himself, fingers digging into the smooth skin of her thighs.

She peaks atop him, his name a sweet sigh on her lips, and he flips them over soon thereafter, taking his pleasure from her like she took from him. He spills inside her, gasping her name into her throat, his lips brushing against her skin.

After, she lays beside him, eyes closed with satiation and exhaustion, Jon’s breath even beside her. She drifts off into sleep, but wakes not long after, the candle beside the bed hardly burnt down any more, the fire still roaring.

She stands from the bed to make water, and when she returns to the room Jon has sat up, bleary eyed, the furs fallen around his waist.

“You okay?” he asks, voice thick with sleep.

“I’m fine,” Sansa replies softly. “Go back to sleep.”

She makes her way over to her washbasin. The water is cold by now, but not chilled. She uses it to wash her hands and face again, then cups some water in her hands to clean her thighs, too. It hadn’t bothered her before, but now she’s aware of the mess she knows she’ll never get to sleep with the evidence of their coupling sticking to her uncomfortably.

Sansa hears the rustle of the furs, and lifts her head to see Jon padding towards her. He’s lean and chiseled and takes no shame in walking towards her completely naked.

Jon picks up the washbasin and kneels before her. “Let me.”

She sets apart her legs, and perhaps it could be sexual, but Jon set’s about cleaning her with such an earnest intensity that it isn’t, not really.

Sansa actually finds it rather romantic.

It’s funny, she thinks, brushing her fingers through his curls. Who would have thought that this would be the type of romance she craves, that she is given. When she was younger, she’d not really grasped what romance truly was.

“I love it when you take care of me.”

Jon looks up at her, sitting back on his heels.

“I can take care of myself,” she clarifies. “And for a long time I thought no one could do it better than I.”

She thinks back to that day, not so long ago, when her trauma and sadness had gotten the best of her, despite her efforts, and nothing she thought could break her from her sorrow. Nothing could break through but Jon, who had let her fall apart in his arms and had then given her the help she needed to put herself back together.

“But you’ve proven to me, again and again, that you want to help.”

“I do,” he replies softly. “Nothing matters to me more than you.”

Sansa kneels down, too, and brushes her fingers against his cheek, then tucks a lock of his hair behind his ear.

“I want us to take care of each forever,” she admits, and saying it aloud is almost more terrifying than if she were to tell him she loves him. “Until the end of our days.”

He leans forward to press a gentle kiss to her lips. His eyes are soft as he looks at her and promises, “Until the end of our days.”

**Author's Note:**

> the second chapter is where we get all our trope-y goodness, and the resolution of romantic (and sexual) tension. it's much more light hearted than this one.


End file.
